That was an excellent (scholarly) response to my post. I watched the Woodstock improv. Funny, but last night I was trying to do some really fast stuff and in this video, Jimi was doing exactly that but with complete control and with knowing exactly what sound he wanted.

Part of his improv is real ad hoc stuff but other parts seem to come from stored memories of other songs. I detected something recognizable in that - it seems it had a spanish quality to it. I wish I could identify it more exactly. It's like an older song/theme from the early 60s.

Anyway, yeah, I know there's people who don't like Jimi. And I wonder how many of those Woodstock hippes "really" liked him or where just there to be cool. And another thing - there's all these Simon Cowell wannabees around - they'd probably find something to knock Jimi about.

I think a lot of people wouldn't be convinced he was a "true genius" unless he played some traditional conservative music, like five-fingered classical maybe. Incidentally, I wonder what Jimi would have done with a pop-classical number like Mason Williams' Classical Gas.

Again, I really appreciate your comments and references, JoRO. A post like yours really makes this website totally worthwhile to belong to. I'll be re-reading it and exploring your suggested references.